


the future is today (so ready your rockets)

by calculus



Series: imagination is the destination [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Hale Fire, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-19
Updated: 2012-11-19
Packaged: 2017-11-19 01:10:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/567340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calculus/pseuds/calculus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Stiles works at Disneyland, and Derek is the long-suffering brother at a family trip.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the future is today (so ready your rockets)

**Author's Note:**

> general disclaimer first: i know nothing about the work schedule or the inner workings of the employees' side of disneyland. i've never been to disneyland, either, so i'm working from what i remember of disney world and what the official website tells me. (i haven't been to disney world in like four or five years either, so. yeah.) inaccuracies abound~!

Stiles likes working the line. He does, he does, he does. He likes ushering kids to their seats, and making sure their seats are properly buckled, that they're safe as possible and ready to scream their heads off as the ride goes off, giving the parents and aunts and uncles and grandparents conspiring grins as they tuck their spawn in, winking at the especially eager children who gape and babble with the childish wonder that still lives within Stiles today. _He does._

But, gods, is it such a bore sometimes. Even with the perks of actually liking his job, Stiles is just not equipped to standing for twelve hours (and a tiny one-hour break time in between shifts) and directing excited children and sullen parents to their seats again and again. A lesser person would break.

At least he's got Space Mountain today for his shift. Last week, he'd been stuck with kiosk duty over in Main Street, USA, and holy gods, can he tell people stories. Grumpy adults and screaming children in ninety-two to a hundred-and-something weather, dear gods, please never again. Give him enclosed, air-conditioned places any time. His best bud Scott's got a pretty solid shift over in Critter Country every Tuesday, and boy, the stories he tells Stiles about wet children and sticky Southern fried foods and those ridiculously huge turkey legs (which he loves, ok, those turkey legs are like the food of the gods), Stiles just shudders to even imagine himself in Scott's shoes.

Anyway. Space Mountain. One of his more favorable gigs. (Although, he's more of a fan of Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blasters, because ok, really? Laser tag and Toy Story? Enough said.)

-  


He directs the next flow of people into the four queues in his section, putting out a hand to stop the next few people once they're all filled up like a boss. He's even got a bit of swagger in his arm movements, the fruit of his nine-months-of-labor here. He then stands by the closest metal gate, leaning casually, waiting for the next ride to come by with its dazed occupants.

Next to him on the other side of the gate, one of the girls standing with her small group of two starts jumping up and down impatiently, trying to see over the barring gate in front of her if the ride's arrived yet for her turn. A few jumps later, she flops down finally, with a small frown and furrowing eyebrows. Out of the corner of Stile's eye, he can tell she's about to explode and he opens his mouth to say something to stop the impending tantrum, but somebody gets there before him.

"Lily, I swear, if you make a scene, I'm not taking you to Fantasyland. I don't care how much you wanted to see Aurora's castle, if you scream here and now, we're going back to where Mom and Billy are sitting and we're staying there for the rest of the day," snaps the tall man standing in her row. Ah, the guardian. The girl, Lily, wheels around, frown gone and replaced by a look of abject horror.

"WHAT. Derek, you promised! You can't say that you'll take me and then not take me! _I'm going to tell mom!_ " Lily shrilly cries, incredulously betrayed. Stiles hides a grin; siblings, it seems.

"I don't care, Lily. I'm not going to stand here and let you ruin everybody else's ride just because you can't keep your mouth shut and wait for a few minutes," says Derek, hissing his words. At that, Lily's chin begins to wobble a little, and Stiles jumps in quickly before she actually starts crying.

"Hey, space cadet! Wanna see a magic trick?" he asks, catching Lily and Derek's attention. He grins at them both, absentmindedly noting Derek's objective attractiveness and pushing it back for later examination, and pulls out a deck of cards he keeps in his pocket for times like this. (His other pocket, he's got at least a small bag of gummy bears and a couple of Space Mountain pins for the really good or annoying-as-fuck kids he just wants to shut up.)

Stiles shuffles the deck a little, hands deftly piling the cards over one another, exaggerating his motions a bit for the already-entranced Lily and the mildly-amused-looking Derek. He holds the deck out to Lily, winks, and says, "Pick a card, any card," biting his tongue at the go-to phrase that always jumps off his tongue whenever he does this particular trick. He hears a quiet snort from Derek and flushes a little, focusing his attention on Lily, who takes the top card with a delicacy he didn't think she was capable of. Smiling widely, he tells her to hold onto the card and remember it while he shuffles the deck again a few times and fanning it out for her to put it back in. He shuffles the deck again, doing another sleight of hand, and takes out the top card from the deck with a flourish.

"Is this your card, cadet?" he asks, eyebrows rising. Lily squeals and reaches for the card, nodding frantically, just as the ride comes through the tunnel with the previous group of ride-goers. Stiles smiles beatifically and sticks the deck back into his pocket, and watches his colleagues standing by go to release the ride-goers from their confines. Lily begins jumping again, this time in barely contained excitement.

"It's here it's here it's here it's hereherehereeeeee!" she squeals, her words slurring at the end in the face of her eagerness. Derek sighs, exasperated, but a small smile sits fondly at his lips as he looks down at his sibling, and Stiles takes the small window of time to fully assess the man before him.

And by gods, is Derek _gorgeous_. Like, smoking hot with a side of holy hell. Stiles almost whimpers out loud because really? Really? How is he supposed to find himself a significant other when he's got Mr. McHotass burned into his retinas? How are them lowly mortals supposed to cope when there are gods like Derek floating around? A pointed clear of the throat snaps Stiles from his inner monologue, and he finds Derek looking at him with a raised eyebrow and smug upward-tilt of his lips, like he knows what Stile's been crying to himself in his mind. Stiles flushes and looks away, silently urging the gates to open faster so he can escape the embarrassment.

As if on command, the metal gates swing open, and Lily crows with triumph and surges for the seats at the front row of the ride. Derek follows behind at a more leisurely pace, and Stiles tries to not watch him pass by or his magnificent ass flash before his eyes as he direct rest of the four groups to their seats.

(Yeah, ok, lie. Derek's ass is even more ridiculous than his face. What is life.)

He goes to the front of the ride once he's done making sure everybody's seated, and he bends down at Lily and Derek's cart to check their seatbelts as is his job. He presses down on Lily's buckle and tests the restrains with a perfunctory push, and smiles at Lily when he's done. She smiles back excitedly, hands gripping the handle bar in front of her, already in the zone for the ride.

Stiles then turns to Derek and smiles uncomfortably at the man, all too aware that he's placing his face and hands near Derek's stupidly attractive lap and tries to do his safety check as quickly and impersonally as possible. After his last yank and push of the safety restraints, he gives another pasted-on smile to Derek and says, "Have a good ride!"

Derek's eyes flash a little darker (if that's even possible, clearly Stiles' eyes are playing tricks on him because the room is way too dark for him to even see such things--oh he's mighty close to Derek's face, he should probably back off a little--) and he gives Stiles a slow once-over, eyes lingering over Stiles' bent posture.

"Hm. I expect to," he responds with a purr, and holy what. What. _What._

"Okay!" Stiles garbles, straightening up, and rushes off to check the rest of the passengers because that's his job that he's getting paid $8.00 an hour for, so he should probably do that instead of dissecting every single word Derek's said and the tones he's used and the look that he gave him and holy gods no. What. _No._

Greek god Derek did not just check him no no _nonono_. This is just Stiles' mind playing tricks again, taunting him with what he can't have. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

-

But, holy _jesus_ is this going to be spank bank material for at least the next eight weeks.

**Author's Note:**

> (also known as the why-the-fuck-am-i-writing-this-instead-of-studying-for-my-exams!au.)
> 
> but for realsies, i just had such a desire for happy!fic and i don't remember seeing many teen wolf fics centering around disneyland (and canonically, i'd like to see that actually happen, an actual trip to the most happy place on earth because god knows these kids need a shit-ton of it with what's been going on so far), so yeah. i couldn't get it out of my mind, so here we are, i guess.
> 
> first teen wolf fic, and first fic in a couple of years, hah hah. nice to get my feet wet again. unbeta'd, so any mistakes you see are because of me and my undiscerning eye. sorry.


End file.
